After visiting with them, Matt Alley drove Marcelo and I all the way back down to Perry, where my cousin Julie and Aunty Jill live. Aunty Jill is my dad's older sister who married an American man and moved to the states to have and raise her family. We have been very fortunate to hold reunions every so often so we know these cousins personally. However, a week with 70 people crammed together is a hard way really to get to know someone. I relished the time I spent in Perry, really getting to know Jill, Julie, Aaron and the kids a little bit better. Unfortunately a couple of weeks before we went to visit, Jill's husband Herb passed away while they were on a short break in Seattle with some friends. Herb was buried in Seattle on the reserve he had lived on with his first wife. Marcelo and I tried to lend a helping hand to Aunty Jill where we could. Mostly picking fruit related, as Herbs kids and grandkids came down to help sort his things out

. Joshua (Julie's eldest) just got back off his mission a day or so before we arrived, so it was great to see him too. It didn't take him too long to get back in to the nature of a true Bleakley. Nocturnalism. At first it was quite funny, (Josh is know for being a bit of a computer wiz like his uncle Matthew) he was asking Julie how the new facebook worked. But within a couple of days he was right back into the swing of things and was doing some programming for David Lyddalls company website. Sean and Jana (Julie's daughter and her husband) were also visiting from Boulder Colorado, where they both go to school. Sean is studying to be an Architect and Jana is studying music. Julie really had a full house. I think there were 8 people, 2 dogs and a cat. Eli, Isaac and Rachel took us hiking - Marcelo nearly stepped on a rattle snake, and Isaac jumped about 2 feet in the air when he realised what Marcelo was saying was 'snake snake...there's a snake beside your foot'! They didn't listen to me when I asked could we take a picture. So there is no photographic evidence of this incident. Julie gave Marcelo free range of the kitchen, which is the best way to do it. Every day we had beautiful Marcelo creations for dinner. He even made Pretzels for Rachel, who has more particular tastes. I was very sad to go at the end of the week. It's the worst part of visiting people. Saying goodbye.